FROM THE EDITOR
Spring has finally arrived. This time of rebirth is also tinged with sadness. We experienced the loss of Sheila Dunning very unexpectedly. As our commercial horticulture agent, certified arborist, and all around powerhouse she will be sorely missed. The knowledge that she had and was always willing to share can never be replaced.
But as I said, this is also a time of rebirth. The azalea featured on the cover is located at the McMahon Environmental Center in Crestview. This was a place near and dear to Sheila’s heart.
She worked a lot of hours to get trees planted, the markers installed and spent untold hours working on displays in the museum there. We held Sheila’s celebration of life at this location and the dogwood’s, azaleas, and other plants put on their best show for the day.
Our new extension building is nearing completion and will be named in Sheila’s honor. Seems only fitting. Our job will be making that landscape one to be proud of as well as the nursery and everything that goes along with it. I know that our group is more than up for this task.
With the warmer weather, folks are getting out in their yards and the calls are coming in fast and furious. Problems with trees, problems with lawns (well, there are always problems with lawns), folks wanting a better vegetable garden this year all these are things that we are fully equipped to help homeowners find the best, science based solutions to their problems. If you don’t know the answer, take the time to find it or find someone who does have the answer.
We’ll have our plant sale soon and a lot of our hard work will be going to new forever homes. Remember while you’re working the sale to smile and never be too busy to stop and answer questions.
Let’s make this our year to really shine. We have a new group of budding (pun intended) master gardener volunteers who have almost completed their internship. Make a place for them and allow them to bloom.
Take the time to make a place for yourself as well and bloom where you are planted. Be the right person in the right place.
Wishing everyone a fantastic Spring season!
Plentiful Plantings
The Editors
Sheila K. Dunning 1964 2025
ENH1382/EP646: Florida Turfgrass
Identification
Identification, Biology, and Management of Goosegrass in Florida Turfgrasses
Common Poisonous Landscape Plant Species in Florida
Dengue and Dengue Virus in Florida
The oriental beetle, Anomala orientalis
Heralding Hoppers: A Guide to Uncovering Leafhoppers, Planthoppers, and Treehoppers with iNaturalist
The Greenhouse Frog in the United States
Diamondback Terrapins of Florida
Tapping into Florida’s Craft Beer Market: A Brewer’s Guide to Consumer Purchasing and Consumption Habits in the Sunshine State “Set It and Forget It” Hydroponic Lettuce
Why Potassium Is Important for Potatoes
Woodpecker Poles and Habitat Wood in Your Yard
ABE 372/AE406 Using Psychrometric Chart for Frost Protection
Black Twig Borer
Ground Pearls
Lost in the Weeds? A Comprehensive Guide to Florida’s Many Non-Native Plant Lists
Did you know that the Okaloosa County Master Gardener Volunteers have a Speaker’s Bureau?
Not only do we have that but we provide monthly lectures free of charge as well!
We asked Debbie Sewell about the programs.
What is the speaker’s bureau and how does it function?
It is a group of Master Gardener Volunteers that have developed presentations for the public. We have a list of the presentations and the speakers. The garden clubs like to have about 30 minutes for the presentations.
Can anyone request a speaker for their group and what is the process to do so?
Yes! Generally, it is garden clubs and sometimes other groups. The group contacts either the speaker bureau chair (currently Karen Sanders)
or the extension office for the list of presentations and speakers. When they have decided on what they want, they contact the speaker’s bureau chair with their request. We don’t give out any personal contact information so the chair forwards the request to the selected speaker. If the speaker is able to honor the request, then the speaker contacts the person who made the request. If the speaker then gives permission to that person/group to contact them directly, then they don’t need to go through the speaker’s bureau for any additional requests for that particular speaker.
How many presentations were done last year? 21
On average, how many contacts does the speaker’s bureau have each year?
450-500 people
So what is the lecture series?
This is a series of lectures that run once a month from March through October. They are intended for the public but the Master Gardener Volunteers are welcome to attend. They are on the third Monday of the month (with one exception this year) at 10 am and we are in the Crestview Extension Auditorium. If there are any door prizes, the MGVs are not eligible. Last year, we started registrations on our own email address MGLecture@yahoo.com. Usually, we allow up to 50 attendees.
What are some of the topics that have been covered with the lecture series?
Last year we had Composting, Tropical plants for summer color, seed saving, new plants, growing mushrooms, daylilies, and wreath making.
Cont’d on next page
What can we look forward to this year?
I don’t want to give away too much about upcoming topics but we do have a bunch of fantastic speakers Dr. Brian Unruh, Marg Stewart, Larry Williams and others.
How many contacts has the lecture series garnered?
Ballpark 400. We have limited attendance to 50 people per program.
What are some of the challenges facing these two activities? Are there future goals planned? Speaker’s bureau always has a challenge of not enough speakers and new programs. Hopefully some of the interns will expand their presentations to about 30 minutes and have them added to the list. With the lecture series it is always a challenge to figure out new topics and who to ask to speak. Hopefully when the new building in the south end is ready, we will be able to schedule every other month at this location.
WORD OF THE DAY
BUMFUZZLE: to confuse or perplex someone
A sure-fire way to bumfuzzle someone is to explain calculating fertilizer.
Did You Know?
Did you know that one acre of forest can absorb up to 40.7 tons of carbon dioxide and produce four tons of oxygen?
Florida’s northwest region supports the largest pineland ecoregion east of the Mississippi River and the second largest pineland ecoregion in the continental United States.
Forests in the United States contribute more than $13 billion to the economy every year and about 15 years of net carbon emissions are stored in our forests.
Beyond their critical role in carbon storage, forests serve as vital shields against extreme weather conditions, such as storms and floods. They are essential in supplying drinking water to nearly half of the largest cities. Not to mention the numerous wildlife species that call our forests home. And don’t forget that urban forests can cool daytime summer air temperatures by about 10° F!
Much Ado about Mulch by
Karen Harper
According to Webster, “mulch is a protective covering (as of sawdust, compost, or paper) spread or left on the ground to reduce evaporation, maintain even soil temperature, prevent erosion, control weeds, enrich the soil, or keep fruit (such as strawberries) clean”. But there is much more to the subject than that. I use mulch extensively and I will share my experience as well as advice from the ‘experts.’ My large yard has some lawn (a small amount), several planting beds, and several areas that are in permanent mulch of one kind or another. Every other year is a ‘mulch year’ here and I usually get two pallets of bagged mulch delivered in 2 cubic ft. bags. That’s 150 bags of mulch. There are other ways to get mulch. I’ve been known to track down tree cutters working in the neighborhood who have their own shredder with them and get them to dump their shredded wood in my driveway which I then wheelbarrow all over the yard wherever it’s needed. A neighbor bought two huge reusable bags from Woerner Turf and he gets them to load cypress mulch into those bags every year which he hauls home and then spreads around his property using a wheelbarrow. The older I get, the more I’ m inclined to stay with the 2 cubic ft. bags, which are easier to move around as needed. They also have the advantage of being easy to conceal in corners of the yard and used as needed vs having a humongous pile out front for everyone to see until I finally get it all spread (which can take months…)
Mulch falls into two basic categories: organic and inorganic. Organic mulch: is a naturally
occurring substance (examples below), not made of anything synthetic. It can suppress weeds, but it doesn't permanently block weeds. Organic mulch will decompose and must be replaced periodically. However, the decomposing material will help improve the soil's structure, drainage, nutrient-holding capacity, and organic content. The drier and woodier the mulch, the slower it decomposes and the fewer nutrients it will give the soil. It can add nutrients to the soil as it decomposes.
Examples of organic mulch include: bark (shredded, or chipped), pine needles, grass clippings, shredded leaves, and newspaper. Suggested uses for each are:
Bark-useful for walkways and large areas without plantings. For planted areas, shredded bark is a much better choice. I generally get cypress mulch but last year in the interest of saving money, I got inexpensive bark chips and had very mixed results with that. It was much cheaper than shredded bark and pretty much indestructible but there are drawbacks. The bags had a lot of miscellaneous shredded tree debris mixed in. We have a dog with a glorious thick tail and an awful lot of that shredded debris comes into the house, woven into her tail, after she’s rolled in the mulch. The bark also promotes some very interesting fungal growth all over the yard, much more than shredded cypress does. AND, the bark debris contained a lot of weed seeds, based on the weeds popping up this spring, which pretty much negates its usefulness as mulch!! Pine Needles-also known as pine straw (pine needles harvested after they've fallen). If you have long-needle pine trees as we do, you have an abundance of pine needles. They make a very attractive, thick, permanent mulch in my food garden (which is fenced off from the dog). There is some concern that pine needles may lower the pH of the soil,
but I have not found that to be a problem for the tomatoes, peppers, berries, beans, cucumbers, etc. that I grow. A soil test would tell you if you need to adjust your soil pH. Pine needles are a good choice if you are looking for a mulch that will not become compacted but suppresses weeds and keeps moisture in the soil. And they look really nice! Grass Clippings- I use a mulching lawnmower, so the grass clippings are returned to the grass here, but from what I have read, grass clippings have drawbacks as mulch: they have a high water content and decompose very rapidly and can get slimy and matted down quickly and are best used on unplanted areas to enrich the soil, or dump them in your compost bin (making sure first that they aren’t treated with herbicides or pesticides). Newspaper- I don’t use them as mulch, but apparently people do! Most newspapers are now using more eco-friendly inks and other products than they did in the past. Avoid using newspapers with colored or glossy inks. To use it in the garden: spread a layer of four to eight sheets of newspaper around the plants. Moisten the sheets and cover the newspaper with 1 to 3 inches of another organic mulch. Leaves- are a natural for many of us who are ‘blessed’ with a lot of trees. They can look messy, though, and you may prefer to leave them whole only on your more ‘woodsy’ areas. If you have a shredder, they make a great mulch on your ornamental gardens. Straw and Hay- Straw decomposes very slowly and can last as mulch for the entire growing season. As a horse owner, I’d caution against using hay as mulch as it is very likely to contain a lot of seeds and actually contribute to your weed problem!
Inorganic mulch is a synthetic material. These do an excellent job of holding moisture and blocking weeds, don’t decompose quickly or require replacing as often as organic mulches, but they don’t add any nutrients to the soil. Examples include: landscape fabric, gravel, and stone. Suggested uses for these are:
Landscape Fabric- this is a porous material that can be cut to fit planting areas and can be effective as a weed barrier, especially around individual plants- in my case a row of azalea bushes. My personal experience with it is that there are two main drawbacks to it: first, if you ever want to plant anything in the row or area where the landscape fabric is, you have to cut through it in order to plant. Secondly, over time, the fabric decomposes, and weeds grow though it as well as on top of it. In other words, it isn’t a weed preventer in the long run. Gravel and Stonethese should be thought of as permanent as they’re very hard to remove. You might use them in a rain garden or other area requiring very good drainage. We use river rock here extensively around the foundations of the garage and other out-buildings, as well as in the utility easement portion of our driveway. The drainage and permanence are pluses in those areas.
When and How to Mulch- generally, mulch is effective when applied at a depth of 2 to 4 inches. Remove existing weeds and any old mulch before applying the new mulch. The best time to apply mulch is at the end of spring and beginning of summer when the soil has warmed up and plants are coming out of winter dormancy. You can apply winter mulch in the
late fall, for plants that may need it for winter. Mulch won’t protect them from freezing, but it can make the freezing process more gradual and reduce excessive freeze-thaw cycles, which is better for your plants. Add organic mulch to newly planted trees or shrubs- to add essential nutrients to the soil and protect the new plants from weeds. Interesting to note: wood-based organic mulch may compete for nitrogen with new plants, so if using bark or shredded bark as mulch, be sure to add nitrogen amendments into the soil at planting time. Rake the mulch over the planting area in an even layer. Water the new mulch in evenly but not excessively. Plan to replace the mulch as needed. The ‘experts’ say replace it yearly, but I’ve found that every other year works very well and gives the old mulch time to decompose and help build up the soil, so 2025 is a no-mulch year for me (yay).
Problems with mulch include: Using too much! Excessive mulch reduces soil oxygen for roots, suffocating them and causing them to die. and may also encourage the plant to root in the mulch and not in the soil, which will cause root decay, especially when the mulch dries out. Mulch piled up against the trunks of trees and shrubs keeps the bark moist underneath the mulch causing decay and a possible entry point for diseases and insects. Prevent Mulch from Touching Your House: When damp mulch touches your siding, it creates a path for termites and other pests to use to get to your home. It’s OK to use mulch against a concrete wall but keep it at least 6 inches away from wood. Avoid Using Dyed Mulch. Read the bag label. Artificial dyes can leach into the soil and destroy beneficial microbes.
KITCHEN KAPERS—KEY LIME BITES
This recipe was submitted by Karen Harper.
Ingredients:
1 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar
2 tsp. Key lime juice
2 tsp. grated Key lime zest
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup chopped macadamia nuts
Icing:
2 cups confectioners’ sugar
1/4 cup Key lime juice
1 tsp grated Key lime zest
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 400°F. In a large bowl, cream butter and confectioners’ sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in lime juice and zest. Combine flour and salt; gradually add to creamed mixture and mix well. Stir in nuts.
2. Shape into 1-in balls. Place 2 in. apart on ungreased baking sheets; flatten slightly.
3. Bake 8-10 minutes or until bottoms are lightly browned. Remove to wire racks to cool completely.
4. In a small bowl, combine icing ingredients. Dip cookies in icing; allow excess to drip off. Place on a wire rack; let stand until set. Store in an airtight container.
Karen Harper’s Key lime tree putting on a show
Grancy greybeard flowering at Environmental Center
The Easter Bunny paid a visit to our Editor’s office!
The Garden Shed—Florida Betony
Florida betony is a weed, and chances are very good it is in your yard. It is ever-present in my yard, but this year I have an especially major infestation of it. There is good news and bad news. I’ll give you the bad news first. Betony is very difficult to control. Not impossible, but you do have to be knowledgeable and diligent about your control efforts. Not content with plaguing Florida, this plant expanded its Florida borders during the 1940s and 1950s to become a problem weed from Texas to North Carolina. For some reason, those people are not grateful for this.
Now the good news. It’s really kind of pretty, as weeds go, if you allow yourself to be objective about it. The root tubers of betony are edible, although this is part of the bad news as well, because this means that unless you dig down and get the entire tuber, the plant lives on into the next millennium, much like dollar weed. If you have loose soil, getting the tuber out is very feasible. If you have sand over tree roots, like I do, it’ s harder but not impossible. More good news is that the plant is active in spring, early summer and fall, but much less so later in the summer, when you are not so inclined to hand pull and dig it up.
by Karen Harper
limited to my ornamental beds. I don’t have betony in my lawn, so use of the herbicides mentioned below are not based on my experience. Please make sure they are safe for use on your type of lawn grass.
Betony in the lawn can be greatly reduced in the lawn using good cultural practices. The amount of infestation in turfgrass will be less if the turfgrass is properly maintained. Preemergent control: Atrazine is recommended for use on centipede, St. Augustine, zoysia and dormant Bermuda. The preferred time to treat Florida betony with sprayable formulations of atrazine (Hi-Yield Atrazine) is mid- to late October during the fall growth flush. An additional atrazine application in mid- to late February should coincide with the spring growth flush on warm season turfgrasses. During the growing season, the following herbicides are said to provide good to excellent control of Florida betony in the lawn: Monument (trifloxysulfuron), Manor (metsulfuron), and Revolver. NOTE: Double check that any herbicide that you plan to use is safe for the type of lawn grass you have.
As far as herbicides, you can (very carefully) spot-spray betony with Roundup, with the knowledge that Roundup will kill other plants that it touches. My own Florida betony problem is
Betony in ornamental beds: There are no recommended herbicides for flower beds. Generous use of mulch can help suppress betony. Dichlobenil (sold under the trade name Casoron®) provides excellent control of Florida betony in most established woody ornamentals, such as woody shrubs and trees, roses and English ivy, but it is not recommended for use in either annual or perennial flowers.
Get digging, friends. And remember, you can eat those betony tubers!
Maybe at some point in your school life you used the excuse that the dog ate your homework.
I wonder what the teacher would have said when I told her that the cat ate my homework.
Well, it wasn’t my homework but rather the shopping list. Yes, that is Luna(tic) with my shopping list well secured by her teeth and looking ever so innocent like it’s the most normal thing in the world for (a) a cat to be in a briefcase and (b) for said cat to be noshing on a shopping list.
After suitable bribery with kitty treats I was able to retrieve my list albeit slightly soggy and punctured and rewrote the darned thing. That got me to thinking. Why write it? I have a phone (like everyone else) why not simply put the list on that thing?
For starters, I have a love/hate relationship with the phone. I might get the list on there but then would have to remember where I put it. Not only that but there’s the typing itself which isn’t always easy on the phone. Especially when the phone decides it knows what you’re trying to say and types in something completely off the wall. I think it’s haunted at times. And I like my paper lists. It’s satisfying to cross things off of a to-do list not so much just hitting a button. Ranks right up there with being on a cell phone and really missing the ability to slam down the receiver. Remember those days?
But I digress. Lists. I live by lists anymore. I don’t trust my memory. Did that once and ended up with 12 things of salt in the pantry
because I couldn’t remember if I bought it or not. The ever present to-do list (some days it is definitely the to-don’t list), Christmas lists, errand lists, appointment lists, every where a list.
I have various sizes of notebooks. Happy Hubby and I use one that lists what I did in the morning and what I need done while I’m at work. He checks things off so we both remember what we did or didn’t do.
I’ve learned not to leave my to-do list where he can find it though he has a nasty habit of adding things to it.
We have a whiteboard on the side of the refrigerator. The idea is to jot down things when you use them up or notice that we’re low on something. Now in theory this would work very well but there are times when I just stare at it and can’t figure out what JD sause bisk actually means. For those not fluent in husband-speak that stands for Jimmy Dean Sausage Biscuits. I never said it was a perfect system we still have bugs to work out.
Go ahead, do it the old-fashioned way. Put down the phone and write out your list of garden things. Find a pad or notebook that you like and a pen or pencil that feels good and start writing out those lists. I have extras if you need one.
Plentiful Plantings
“If you can dream it, you can do it. Start with a list.”
Walt Disney
“The best way to get started is to quit talking and being doing. A list can help with that.”
Also Walt Disney
Equal Opportunity Institution
Mission
To assist Extension Agents in providing research-based horticultural education to Florida residents.
Vision
To be the most trusted resource for horticultural education in Florida.
The Compost Pile is a quarterly publication created by the Okaloosa County Master Gardener Volunteers.
Marg Stewart Editor
Karen Harper, Debbie Sewell, Katy McMackin Co-Editors
